In-Flight Emergencies

Tips for maintaining and regaining situational awareness

A student pilot on a solo cross-country flight found some of his checkpoints, but after the flight's calculated time en route, he could not find the airport. The student became disoriented and the airplane entered Class B airspace, ran out of fuel, and made a forced landing two miles from an international airport.

A noninstrument-rated private pilot received five weather briefings and before departing on a VFR cross-country flight was told that VFR was not recommended. En route the pilot reported that he was descending to remain VFR; the airplane then climbed, entered a left descending 270-degree turn, and crashed.

These two accidents, among the many National Transportation Safety Board reports in the AOPA Air Safety Foundation's Aviation Safety Database, are representative of the most common scenarios resulting from loss of situational awareness. Becoming lost or disoriented is seldom fatal, while spatial disorientation — when it becomes an accident's cause — very often is.

Controlled flight into terrain (CFIT) also involves situational awareness. A textbook example is the crash of TWA's Flight 514 on December 1, 1974 (see " Safety Pilot Landmark Accidents: Cleared for the Approach," June 1998 Pilot). The Boeing 727 flew into terrain 25 miles from Washington Dulles International Airport. The crew thought that it had been cleared to descend and did — but the descent should not have been made until the flight reached a fix more than seven miles beyond the crash site.

Situational awareness is a term that became popular with the advent of crew resource management — a training concept that focuses on crew communication and coordination. For single-pilot operations, crew resource management evolved into cockpit resource management (CRM). The theory is that preparation and organization can help to improve flight safety, even if there isn't a copilot to help with the flying chores. (CRM can reach outside the cockpit. When flying single pilot under IFR, or while receiving VFR traffic advisories, air traffic control may be considered a resource. Controllers have talked disoriented instrument pilots out of graveyard spirals.) CRM's goal is to help the pilot in command make the best-informed decisions possible.

Situational awareness is the key, and it's stick-and-rudder simple. It means knowing what's going on around you. Visualize the location of your aircraft relative to your route, terrain, other traffic, any adverse weather conditions, and the duration of your fuel supply. When any of these factors change, consider the significance of the change and how it might affect the outcome of the flight.

Diminished situational awareness is most likely to occur when you're preoccupied, distracted, or fatigued. If you feel as though something's just not right — whether it's that intense feeling in your gut or just a nagging thought — then something probably is wrong. Other danger signals include:

• The flight fails to meet planned targets. If waypoints or checkpoints don't appear at the times you calculated, is it because of a stronger-than-forecast headwind — or is the engine not producing full power? Have you set power correctly and leaned properly?
• Instrument indications are not as expected. You tune in the next VOR on your route and the needle deflects fully. Are you off course, is the OBS set to the wrong radial — or did you tune the wrong frequency and not identify the station?
• You don't recall the last time that you looked out the window. If you're in visual meteorological conditions, whether operating IFR or VFR, and even if you're receiving radar services, there is an obligation to look for traffic.

Situational awareness goes beyond looking for conflicting traffic, although that's certainly part of the equation. GPS has been a boon to lightplane pilots everywhere, but how many pilots simply punch "Direct To" and go? Double-check that the unit is providing navigation to your intended destination; it's easy to hit a wrong button, or make a wrong guess of the airport's identifier. If the GPS signal should become unusable — or your batteries die — will you still know where you are? Of course you will if you're tracking your progress on a chart or with ground-based navaids.

Moving-map GPSs can be a boon to situational awareness, and if something feels really wrong and you want an airport right now, the nearest airport function can be a lifesaver. Remember our lost student pilot? The FAA has been slow to incorporate GPS into the Private Pilot Practical Test Standards, and as a result, some CFIs won't teach its use. If the trainer has a GPS receiver, however, the student should at least know how to use the nearest airport function before the first solo cross-country.

Pilots flying IFR should visualize their location relative to their next waypoint or navaid. If the route's unfamiliar, do you know what the terrain's like down there beneath the clouds? Minimum en route and minimum obstruction clearance altitudes on instrument charts give a clue, but many instrument pilots carry sectionals or world aeronautical charts for a more detailed depiction. What about the big weather picture? The location of the nearest VFR weather should be part of every IFR briefing.

Altitude awareness is of particular concern to pilots flying IFR. Absent other air traffic control instruction, you can't descend until you've been cleared for the approach and you're on a published portion of the approach. (Remember TWA 714?) Altitude busts account for a whopping 73 percent of in-flight pilot deviations, according to the FAA.

Approach and landing usually present the highest work load of the flight — yet they deserve special attention because pilot fatigue will also be at its peak, especially on a long trip. Maintain that high level of situational awareness by obtaining weather (or a unicom advisory); tuning tower, ground, or other necessary frequencies; and running your prelanding checklist before entering the airport traffic area.

What if, despite your best efforts, you lose your situational awareness? First and foremost, fly the airplane, or delegate that task to your copilot. If necessary, say to yourself, "Airspeed, altitude, heading." Engage the autopilot if you have one, and consider slowing the airplane while you resolve the problem. Check your fuel status.

Make use of your cockpit and crew resources. Use independent instruments to evaluate suspect indications. Try the mnemonic decide for a process to help resolve the uncertainty: Detect the anomaly or uncertainty; estimate its significance to the flight; choose a safe outcome for the flight; identify plausible actions; do take action on the best option; and evaluate the action's effect on the uncertainty and on the flight's progress. Seek help from outside the cockpit if necessary.

E-mail the author at [email protected].

Running on Empty

Fuel exhaustion and starvation continue to be a major cause of general aviation accidents. Although good situational awareness isn't a talisman for every potential problem, it can help to keep you from running out of fuel.

Many lightplane fuel gauges are hideously inaccurate, although they do provide some information — for example, if that needle is moving from "F" to "E" twice as fast as usual, suspect a stuck fuel drain or a missing cap. Look outside, for starters.

The situationally aware pilot will track his or her fuel consumption independently of the gauges. Remember that endurance counts here, not range. Topping the tanks is always a good idea, unless weight forces you to take off with less than full fuel.

Know your fuel system. Fuel starvation — landing with a quiet engine while there is still fuel in the airplane — still happens. And don't overlook your fuel state if your flight is interrupted by the need to resolve an anomaly.

Land and refuel before your supply gets critically low, even if you are almost home. Continual worry about reserves is a sign that you need to stop. A precautionary landing with power, even off-airport, is preferable to the dead-stick equivalent. — MPC